This Weblog or "Blog" contains articles, events and opinions that support capital punishment in North Carolina and elsewhere. Author(s) of the contents are exercising their rights to free speech which unfortunately is often stifled or ignored by the media.
Contrary to what you might read or hear in the news, North Carolinians should be proud that an occassional and deserved execution is allowed to proceed.
- Wayne Uber

Monday, March 04, 2013

OF COURSE THE DEATH PENALTY DETERS:

Of Course The Death Penalty Deters: A review of the debate
Dudley Sharp

If you are unsure about deterrence, then you can risk sacrificing more innocent lives by not using the death penalty or you can "risk" saving more innocent lives by using it.

Make your choice.

It is odd that anyone would think the death penalty was not a
deterrent.

1) The evidence that the death penalty deters some is overwhelming. The evidence that the death penalty deters none is non existent.

2) All prospects of a negative outcome deter some. That is a truism.
Execution is the most severe negative outcome for criminals.

3) Death is feared more than life. Life is preferred over death. That which we fear more, deters more. That which we prefer more deters less.

4) No study finds that the death penalty deters none. They cannot. No
credible academic says the death penalty deters none. Rationally and factually, they
cannot.

The case for death penalty deterrence, as with all criminal deterrents, overwhelms the evidence that none are deterred, an absurdity.

5) There are numerous cases where it has been found that potential
murderers have been deterred from committing murder, because of their fear of
the death penalty (1).

This is known as individual deterrence. The death penalty
deters some. Not only is such confirmed, it cannot be rebutted, as neither
rationally nor factually can anyone state the death penalty deters none.

6) General deterrence exists, because individual deterrence could not exist
without it.

7) Anti death penalty folks say that the burden of proof is
on those who say that the death penalty deters. Untrue. It is a rational
truism that all potential negative outcomes deter some - there is no exception.

It, then, follows that it is the burden of death penalty opponents to prove
that the death penalty, the most severe of criminal sanctions, is the only
prospect of a negative outcome that deters none. They cannot.

8) All criminal sanctions deter. If you doubt that, what do you think would
happen if we ended all laws, all criminal sanctions and all law enforcement? No rational person has any doubt.
All aspects of what we now call "crime" would rise, some overwhelmingly. Somalia comes to mind.

Some would have us, irrationally, believe that the most severe sanction,
execution, is the only sanction which deters none.

9) All criminal sanctions, regardless of crime/murder rates, deter some
(2). Just because crime/murder rates are low in one jurisdiction and high in
another, doesn't mean that no one is deterred in the jurisdiction with
higher rates, as death penalty opponents would claim.

We all know that within
different states or countries, there are towns, cities and neighborhoods which
have varying crime/murder rates. All sanctions deter in all of those
jurisdictions, but they have different rates because of different circumstances
(2). It is not that none are deterred, simply because there are higher
crime/murder rate in one jurisdiction than another. The claim is irrational on
its face (2).

Let's say that the country of Iceland and the city/state of Singapore have the lowest of all crime and murder rates. Does that mean that in all other cities and countries that none are deterred, because all of them have higher rates than Singapore and Iceland? Again, it's ridiculous on its face, but that is what anti death penalty folks are saying, in contradiction of common sense, reason and history.

10) Anti death penalty columnists Eric Zorn of the Chicago Tribune states,
"No one argues that the death penalty deters none." "Will someone bent on murder
turn from the crime when he contemplates the fact that he may be executed for
it? Obviously that will happen." (3).

More precisely, it "does" happen and
always has.

Zorn is in error. Some do argue, without rational and factual support, that the
death penalty deters none.

Zorn is correct, the issue is not "Does the death
penalty deter?". It does.

The only issue is to what degree.

Therefore, anti
death penalty efforts must contend with the reality that sparing murderers does
sacrifice more innocent lives , by reduced deterrence, lesser incapacitation and
lesser due process, and executing murderers does save more innocent lives, by
enhanced incapacitation, enhanced deterrence and enhanced due process.

11) Even the dean of anti death penalty academics, Hugo Adam Bedau, agrees
that the death penalty deters, but he doesn't believe it deters more than a
life sentence (4).

He's right. It deters.

The evidence is that the death penalty is an enhanced deterrent over a life sentence.

Nearly 100% of those murderers subject to the death penalty do everything they can to avoid the death penalty (5).

What of potential murderers?

They, like the rest of us, embrace/prefer life more than death and fear death more than life.

That which we fear the most, deters the most. That which we embrace/prefer more, deters less.

Both the anecdotal and rational evidence finds that the
death penalty is a greater deterrent than a life sentence.

The
evidence is expressly clear and overwhelming that death is feared more than life
and life is preferred over death, not just for potential murderers who may face execution, but by a
majority of all of us.

When 99.7% of murderers, who are subject to the
death penalty, tell us they fear death more than life (5) and when about 99.9%
of the rest of us (excluding the determined suicidal and/or terribly ill) tell
us they prefer life over death, it is a certainty that some potential murderers,
overwhelmingly feel the same, and thus fear execution more than
life.

What we fear the most deters the most. This is historically,
factually and rationally true.

Life is preferred over death. Death is
feared more than life. No surprise.

Would a more rational group, those who
choose not to murder, also share in that overwhelming fear of death and be
deterred by the prospects of execution? Of course - just as we all do.

12) There is substantial factual evidence for anecdotal death penalty
deterrence and as an enhanced deterrent (1).

13) Consider:

a) If we execute and there is no deterrence, we have justly punished a
murderer and have prevented that murderer from ever harming/murdering, again, thus saving more innocent lives.

b) If
we execute and there is deterrence, we have those benefits (a), plus we have spared
even more additional innocent lives via deterrence;

c) If we don't execute and
there is deterrence, we have spared murderers at the cost of more innocent
deaths, via the loss of a greater deterrent, as well as by lesser
incapacitation;

d) If we don't execute and there is no deterrence, we risk more
harm and death to innocents, because living murderers harm and murder, again.
Executed murderers do not.

"If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have
killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would
in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of
innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a
tough call."

John McAdams - Marquette University/Department of Political Science

14) "How much does the death penalty deter?". There will never be a
consensus answer to that question. Even the 28 studies that have found for death
penalty deterrence since 1997, have widely different findings, that from 1-28
murderers are deterred per execution (or 33 to 924 saved per year via deterrence, or 1,320 - 36,960 lives saved, for the forty years, 1973-2012. This is an average from when new statutes came into law, post Furman, 1972. Executions did not resume until 1977 (6)

Although these studies have been
subject to criticism, the criticism, itself, has either been rebutted and/or the
criticism is weaker than the studies finding for deterrence (7), inclusive of the horrendous National Research Council hatchet job by Prof. Nagin.. To my knowledge, all of the authors finding for deterrence stand by their studies. In addition, none of the criticism negates 1-12, and/or 14, herein.

Even without
those 28 studies, the argument for death penalty deterrence and its enhanced
deterrent effect overwhelms any claim that the death penalty deters none,
for which no evidence exists.

15) Reason, common sense, history and the facts support that the death penalty deters and deters more than lesser sanctions.

If you are concerned about innocent lives that deserve to be saved, you
will support the death penalty (8).

If you are unsure about deterrence, then you can risk sacrificing more innocent lives by not using the death penalty or you can "risk" saving more innocent lives by using it.

FOOTNOTES

(1) Some factual evidence for specific cases of individual deterrence.

b) One Iowa prisoner, who escaped from a transportation van, with a
number of other prisoners, stated that he made sure that the overpowered guards
were not harmed, because of his fear of the death penalty in Texas. The
prisoners were being transported through Texas, on their way to New Mexico, when
the escape occurred. Most compelling is that he was a twice convicted murderer
from a non death penalty state, Iowa. In addition, he was under the false
impression that Texas had the death penalty for rape and, as a result, also
protected the woman guard from assault. "Langley says Texas death penalty
affected his actions during escape", by Stephen Martin, The Daily Democrat (Ft.
Madison, Iowa), 1/8/97, pg 1.

c) New York Law School Professor Robert Blecker recorded his interview
with a convicted murderer. The murderer robbed and killed drug dealers in
Washington DC., where he was conscious that there was no death penalty. He
specifically did not murder a drug dealer in Virginia because, and only because,
he envisioned himself strapped in the electric chair, which he had personally
seen many times while imprisoned in Virginia. pending book, rblecker@nyls.edu

d) Senator Dianne Feinstein explained, ''I remember well in the 1960s
when I was sentencing a woman convicted of robbery in the first degree and I
remember looking at her commitment sheet and I saw that she carried a weapon
that was unloaded into a grocery store robbery. I asked her the question: ‘Why
was your gun unloaded?’ She said to me: ‘So I would not panic, kill somebody,
and get the death penalty.’ That was firsthand testimony directly to me that the
death penalty in place in California in the sixties was in fact a
deterrent.''California District Attorneys Association, ''Prosecutors Perspective
on California’s Death Penalty,'' March 2003

4) "An Abolitionist's Survey of the Death Penalty in America Today", Hugo
Adam Bedau, Chapter 2, within Debating the death penalty: should America have
capital punishment? : the experts on both sides make their case, editors Hugo
Adam Bedau, Paul G. Cassell, Oxford University Press, 2004. SHARP REVIEW: AN
EXCELLENT BOOK PRESENTING BOTH SIDES.

5) LIFE: MUCH PREFERRED OVER EXECUTION:
99.7% of murderers tells us
"Give me life, not execution"